MedWorm provides a medical RSS filtering service. Over 6000 RSS medical sources are combined and output via different filters. This feed contains the latest medical blog items that have been tagged with 'autistics'. Sat, 03 Sep 2011 02:32:30 +0100 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3316211&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35128&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthiswayoflife.org%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D419 As I was reading another email thread about what autistics can and can’t do, I was reminded that this is a key way our views or discredited. The means of discrediting is simple: if the autistic person doesn’t follow the stereotype the other person has of an autistic person (or Real Autistic if you prefer), then they aren’t actually autistic. Thus, what they say is irrelevant and can be ignored. Ironically, often the people who want us ignored because we aren’t autistic are also not autistic themselves – but somehow that gets ignored. After all, once we’re discredited, we are supposed to have no more say in the argument. It’s the height of hypocrisy. It becomes a frustrating place to be, once dismissed as a “true autistic”. I can only im... NTs Are Weird blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3316211 Sat, 27 Feb 2010 23:12:13 +0100 3316211 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3200617&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35128&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthiswayoflife.org%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D428 Apparently, to be “fully” autistic, one must meet the new diagnostic criteria – one must be unsuccessful and unhappy. I know this isn’t in any of the official criteria, but it does seem to be in many people’s unofficial criteria. In their eyes, autism is so horrible that nobody with autism could actually be enjoying life, successful at a job, etc. Maybe someone with only “traits” or who is “Asperger’s” rather than autistic could, but not someone who is a real autistic (not my beliefs – I am repeating theirs). Kind of convenient, huh? If you can’t be happy or successful, then it wouldn’t particularly matter if you received good services. It wouldn’t matter if your education was worthwhile. It wouldn’t ... NTs Are Weird blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3200617 Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:16:28 +0100 3200617 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2993899&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35128&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthiswayoflife.org%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D395 I’ve written a lot about the medical vs. social model of disability, particularly in response to misunderstandings about the social model. For instance, I’ve talked about how nearsightedness or color blindness isn’t considered a disability, despite the fact that both are examples of eyes “lacking” some ability. This is because society decides what is a disability, and it’s not based upon medical opinion, but rather social stigma and opinion, as well as, in many cases, the availability of socially-acceptable accommodation (such as eye glasses). But that’s not what I’m writing about today (even though I did find a really cool site that will let you check your website/blog/image/whatever to see if people who are color blind could use it – ... NTs Are Weird blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2993899 Sun, 15 Nov 2009 14:39:37 +0100 2993899 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1556687&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=37107&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aspieweb.net%2Fshould-i-be-ashamed-of-the-autism-speaks-tshirt-ordeal%2F There are some people out there who think I and other Autistic individuals who jumped the gun about this T-shirt incident should be ashamed.  I really don’t think so, and this is why. It seems some individuals such as this guy believe that we are ‘bigotoed’ and ‘throw common sense out the window’ on a regular [...] (Source: AspieWeb.net) AspieWeb.net blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1556687 Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:59:37 +0100 1556687 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1338060&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35130&url=http%3A%2F%2Fautisticbfh.blogspot.com%2F2008%2F03%2Freporting-live-from-closet.html One of the more frustrating aspects of the media's ignorant panic-mongering about autism over the past few years has been the reluctance of autistic journalists and media executives (who presumably exist in numbers reflecting the proportion of autistics in the general population) to speak out against the widespread bigotry. The drums of the autism war have been beating so loudly that most people who are at risk of being targeted have gone into full duck-and-cover mode, just hoping that the madness ends before they find themselves and their families in the line of fire.To make myself clear, I do not intend any criticism of those who made the choice to stay quiet and pass as non-autistics to protect their careers and their civil rights. Staying in the closet is an entirely reasonable and pru... Whose Planet Is It Anyway? blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1338060 Mon, 31 Mar 2008 18:54:00 +0100 1338060 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1182854&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35128&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthiswayoflife.org%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D175 There seems to be a renewed trend from people who either want autism to be cured or who want to emphasize how awful autism is (sometimes to win the “I have it worse than you” argument). They want to redefine autistic disorder and Asperger’s. So, you see, there’s something that is missing in the current criteria, something that distinguishes autism and Asperger’s, according to them. No, it isn’t the different spatial abilities that some researchers hypothesize are the difference. Nor is it the presence or absence of a speech delay early in life, as others suggest. No, it’s much simipler. Autistics are people who agree with me and I believe have autism. Aspies are people who disagree with me and whom I don’t believe have autism. (of course you ... NTs Are Weird blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1182854 Mon, 28 Jan 2008 14:43:22 +0100 1182854 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=716626&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35084&url=http%3A%2F%2Fballastexistenz.autistics.org%2F%3Fp%3D416 (Written by Laura Tisoncik, not me — also on the front page of autistics.org) My Declaration of Independence Ours is a community filled with computer geeks. I don’t, properly, happen to be one. I’m a computer-literate political organizer. Yet somehow I’ve found myself having to decipher Bind9 (I can’t), disentangle one mailsystem from another (something else I can’t do), be the lead person on computer security (another subject way over my head) and lord knows what else. That I can’t do what I’m not trained to do and have little talent to do seems irrelevant to the rest of the community. The only problem they see is that I don’t do what they want me to do — that the scripts aren’t running right, that they don’t have fea... Ballastexistenz blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=716626 Fri, 06 Jul 2007 04:06:20 +0100 716626 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=691310&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35084&url=http%3A%2F%2Fballastexistenz.autistics.org%2F%3Fp%3D410 autistics.org needs help debugging a Postfix/Dovecot mailsystem and help debugging Bind. (Source: Ballastexistenz) Ballastexistenz blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=691310 Sat, 23 Jun 2007 02:20:07 +0100 691310 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=683250&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35084&url=http%3A%2F%2Fballastexistenz.autistics.org%2F%3Fp%3D408 And People Still Fail to Get It, Again and Again By a student who’s been fighting for accessible education for a long time. Quote from it: These things– accomodation, and related issues– are rights, not privileges. But even if I can acknowledge that intellectually, I’m so used to having to shut the hell up in order to get anything at all that my gut reaction when anyone gives me any kind of accomodation at all is fear– waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for them to decide I’m a horrible person who’s just making excuses and is trying to drag out some manipulative game to see just how much of a free ride I can get, and to decide I deserve nothing at all. I’m seen as some kind of puppetmaster, when in reality I’m the ones on the s... Ballastexistenz blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=683250 Tue, 19 Jun 2007 03:32:36 +0100 683250 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=487651&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35092&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.autistics.org%2Fdemonized%2F%3Fp%3D13 Now I’m going to look at The Siege, by Clara Claiborne Park. This is the book that Catherine Maurice found inspiration for battle metaphors in. It’s another classic in autism literature by parents, and was originally written in 1967. The version I have here is a 1982 version with a newer epilogue. The first chapter of the book is called “The Changeling”. From page 5: Once a friend, seeing for the first time her pale skin and straight yellow hair, her clear blue eyes and the dancing grace of her body, called her a fairy child. And there was a fairy lightness in her movements, a fairy purity in her detached gaze. As time passed and she grew taller, leaner, older, her face seemed not to record time’s passage. She carried none of the stigmata of the defective; not... Autism Demonized blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=487651 Mon, 27 Nov 2006 08:54:32 +0100 487651 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=487652&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35092&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.autistics.org%2Fdemonized%2F%3Fp%3D12 , by Catherine Maurice, is considered a classic in narratives by parents of autistic children. Page 57: I was in a race against time, and either I found someone or something that truly helped or I had lost Anne-Marie forever. It was as simple as that. There is something about autism that to me gave meaning to the phrase “death in life.” Autism is an impossible condition of being there and not being there; a person without a self; a life without a soul This is more of what’s becoming almost standard in the entries on this blog. Autism as death. Autism as soullessness. Autism as being lost. Later on, Maurice describes her daughter in the following way on page 63: Anne-Marie was so far gone by this point that she spent the evaluation period curled on the floor in a fetal po... Autism Demonized blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=487652 Sun, 26 Nov 2006 20:12:36 +0100 487652 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=487656&cid=t_189746_133_f&fid=35092&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.autistics.org%2Fdemonized%2F%3Fp%3D8 Excerpts from Autism Research: A Legacy of Neglect, an Opportunity for New Discovery by Jonathan Shestack, co-founder and president of Cure Autism Now. No formula can tell me: Will he be whole or will he be mysteriously, tragically broken like his older brother? The brother who hardly seems to know he exists. The brother who has autism. … This is the special curse of autism. You have your child, and yet you don’t have him. You have a shell, a ghost of all the dreams and hopes you ever had. … No matter how much time goes by, we never quite get over it, we never get used to it. Every lost tooth, every birthday, is a reminder that all too soon the autistic child will become the autistic adult, and the moment of opportunity may be lost. So autism is a state of being “my... Autism Demonized blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=487656 Tue, 14 Feb 2006 14:43:00 +0100 487656